Place name question.

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Ian Goddard

Place name question.

Legg inn av Ian Goddard » 26 aug 2007 20:48:00

OT but there doesn't appear to be a place name newsgroup and some
erudite person here might have the answer.

The element "worth" is normally given as "enclosure" in place name
etymology. To my mind, however, this is ambiguous. Is it an enclosure
round a farmstead (cf a rath for those familiar with Irish archaeology)
or an enclosure in the sense of the Enclosure Acts, i.e. putting a fence
around previously open ground to delimit the space within for agriculture?

Christopher Ingham

Re: Place name question.

Legg inn av Christopher Ingham » 26 aug 2007 21:57:11

On Aug 26, 3:48 pm, Ian Goddard <godda...@hotmail.co.uk> wrote:
OT but there doesn't appear to be a place name newsgroup and some
erudite person here might have the answer.

The element "worth" is normally given as "enclosure" in place name
etymology. To my mind, however, this is ambiguous. Is it an enclosure
round a farmstead (cf a rath for those familiar with Irish archaeology)
or an enclosure in the sense of the Enclosure Acts, i.e. putting a fence
around previously open ground to delimit the space within for agriculture?

This an entry for "worth" in the_OED_, 2nd ed. (1989). The letter
written as "p" in the Old English words "worp," "weorp." and "wurp"
represent the runic thorn.

_worth_. Now only_Hist._ Also_woorth_. [Old
English_worp_(weorp)_,_wurp_' = OS_wurd_,_word_.] An enclosed place,
a homestead.

Christopher Ingham

Except in quot. 1649, only by inference from place in which it forms
the second element.

1575 Lane_Let._(1871) 4 The name..iz called Kenelvvorth. Syns most
of the Worths in England stand ny vntoo like lakez [etc.]. 1628
Coke_On Litt._ 5b, Worth signifieth a watry place or water. 1649
_Deed of Conveyance, Windsor_, All those two closes..one..on ye
Spittlehill and the other in the Woorth commonly called Margret Acre.
1917 _Q. Rev._Oct. 338 Probably the 'worths' were farms on clearings
made later than the original settlements.

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